Templeton Dragon Closed Fund (TDF) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Misc. Financial Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Templeton Dragon Closed Fund (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Templeton Dragon Closed Fund, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Templeton Dragon Closed Fund operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund
2. Improving business portfolio management of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Misc. Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund
Strengths of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is present in almost all the verticals within the Misc. Financial Services industry. This has provided Templeton Dragon Closed Fund a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Financial Services industry
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has one of the best training and development program in Financial industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in Misc. Financial Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Templeton Dragon Closed Fund to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry. The technology infrastructure of United States is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Ability to lead change in Misc. Financial Services
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Templeton Dragon Closed Fund to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is just above the Misc. Financial Services industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has some of the most successful models in the Misc. Financial Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Templeton Dragon Closed Fund vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the Misc. Financial Services industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Financial Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on Templeton Dragon Closed Fund ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Misc. Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Misc. Financial Services industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Skills based hiring in Misc. Financial Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Financial Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Misc. Financial Services industry over the last five years. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Templeton Dragon Closed Fund Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Misc. Financial Services industry.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Misc. Financial Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Misc. Financial Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in the Misc. Financial Services industry. Now Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Misc. Financial Services sector. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Misc. Financial Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Templeton Dragon Closed Fund to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Financial Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help Templeton Dragon Closed Fund to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Templeton Dragon Closed Fund External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Misc. Financial Services sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Misc. Financial Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in Misc. Financial Services industry. The Misc. Financial Services industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Templeton Dragon Closed Fund demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in Misc. Financial Services industry and other sectors.
Regulatory challenges
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Misc. Financial Services industry regulations.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Templeton Dragon Closed Fund has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Misc. Financial Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Misc. Financial Services sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is facing in Misc. Financial Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Templeton Dragon Closed Fund in the Misc. Financial Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Templeton Dragon Closed Fund can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate Templeton Dragon Closed Fund prominent markets.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Templeton Dragon Closed Fund to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Templeton Dragon Closed Fund needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.